


Hop, Skip, Jump, Fall

by KicknRun



Category: Stand Still Stay Silent
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Constructive Criticism Welcome, Gen, LOOK MA i'm following canon, Possession, Team Bonding, also, also each chapter name is a common phrase or some such, ha no, hehehhehehe, i might as well tag this as, i will updated every three weeks at the very least, its not much of a theme but it is a theme, lalli gets mad at reynir, no seriously i need it, of a sort, originally posted on the forum, renyir is there in spirt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-23
Updated: 2015-05-16
Packaged: 2018-04-01 23:49:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4039363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KicknRun/pseuds/KicknRun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Emil stopped in surprise as something wrapped itself around his wrist. Was it Lalli? No, it was too rough to be as smooth as his gloves had looked. A rope, maybe. No. Trolls can't throw ropes, can th-.</p><p> </p><p>-An unknown force takes its grasp over Emil, leaving the team with a somebody who isn't the person they have come to know.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Abandon all hope, ye who enter here

-=0=-  
The world is blue and white and dead and alive and poisoned and healthy and you are lost.

(You are alone.)

-=1=-

Emil marched unhappily, with Sigrun in front of him and Lalli at his heels. A chunk of brick from the greyish-red wall to the side of him caught his foot, but he managed to keep himself upright. He wasn't terribly excited about the raid. It was a few days after the first one and he still felt exhausted. And scared of Sigrun. Mostly scared of Sigrun.  
Even though he had blown up a building, killed a troll and was going to have quite the story to tell,( And had also nearly killed Lalli, but he didn’t want to think about that) he didn't feel prepared at all. In fact, he felt pretty nervous.

-=2=-

Lalli stiffened. There was a spirit here. No, wait, there wasn't. Whatever presence that was there was gone. Back again. Strange.  
His spell should have removed most of the spirits from the area. Whatever. It didn't matter if there was one here. This place was filled with them. Some would have returned, even after his spell three(four?) days ago.  
A long streak of red sped past by him and stopped. So it was a spirit. Okay then. Lalli fixed his eyes on it as it stopped and turned towards them. It was showing itself as a long, red braid, which was strange, but unimportant. He dismissed it.

(In hindsight, this was his first mistake)

-=1=-

Emil stopped in surprise as something wrapped itself around his wrist. Was it Lalli? No, it was too rough to be as smooth as his gloves had looked. A rope, maybe. No. Troll's can't throw ropes, can th-.  
This train of thought abruptly ended when whatever it was started wrapping itself around him. Emil tried to look down, but found he couldn't. But he could feel it, forcefully pressing his arms to his sides and locking his sides together. Emil felt like one of the toy soldiers he would play with when he was little. Only the battle was real, and he wasn't quite sure he would win.  
Then something like hair, no it was hair started prying his lips open, almost gently,like whatever was doing this cared. Then it uncurled itself and surged through his mouth,suffusing Emil Vasterstöm with something that simply was not. He had enough time to think "I wonder if this is what eating a hairball feels like?",before his sight faded to blue.

-=2=-

Then suddenly, the spirit twisted around and sped towards them, zooming over the dead and dusty ground, wrapping itself over Emil’s wrist, and too quickly for Lalli to react, his whole body. Then the spirit when up and into Emil, and he jerked once,twice, thrice and feel to the ground.

-=3=-

Sigrun had turned around by now, years of fighting and training and not dying having honed her senses to near-perfect clarity in reference to the things around her. Like the ground under her. And the crumbling Old World wall next to her. The spasming trainee in front in her.

Lalli had stopped, standing absolutely still with some emotion so far gone she couldn't recognize it. He eyes were still moving, staring not at Emil’s body but above it like he was seeing something different, something nobody could or would want to see. Something pricked in her mind about finnish mages and sight, but she didn’t have time to remember it enough for it to matter. Besides, it wasn't like it would prove to be important or anything. 

Enough thinking, anyway. She had to get him out of here. Sigrun hoped he wasn't too heavy. He groaned and rolled over, revealing a cut on his cheek. It didn’t look like much of a problem, so that was good. But as she got closer, a sickening sense of deja vu caught her. She looked at Emil again. Or more specifically,his hair. Which was long now, long and thick and braided.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's my new story!!!!!! What such a wonderfully happy chapter title. So full of hope. So full of joy. FYI,the chapter is 693 words long, which is pretty dang long by my standards.
> 
> Sorry if it sounds pretentious, because that is not the way I would like for it to go about.


	2. Blind Leading the Blind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They start to move Emil, and other horrible things.

-=1=-

Emil is here. Emil groans and rolls over. Emil is gone.

-=0=-

After you submerge yourself in him, take his form and make it yours, there is a feeling of peace, of senses, of reality. (there is a feeling of nothing. you do not notice the change). But for only a moment, long enough to raise yourself up only to fall down again. You have not raised yourself up. You have not fallen. 

You feel. A long time of nothing becomes an increasing time of everything, your cheek burns hot with his blood(he was bleeding? when?) and burns cold with the frost-tongued air of winter (is it still?). You feel the pain of his back, and the feeling of the clothes against his skin. Part of you welcomes it, this feeling of overfeeling. Most of you, however, does not.

(It is the first time you consider vacating this body. It will not be the last.)  
-=2=-

Lalli stood there, shocked. The shock turned to fear. Then to incredulity. Then to some tangled up mess he didn’t have time to untangle. Spirits did not do that. Spirits do not go into people. A spirit had done just that. 

Sigrun gets closer to Emil, who groans and rolls over, right before his world flips. Lalli shudders with revulsion, as a feeling of perversion of all that has been done and all that will ever be done courses through him. His free will vanishes, just for a second. It is a long second.

The feeling of unceasing wrongness stops. Emil has a braid.

(His world gets back up. It does not right itself.)

-=3=-

Sigrun grabbed Emil’s arm and started dragging him up. She wasn’t sure at all what had just happened, but she didn’t need her teammate getting her killed just because he had gotten infected by some weird Silent World magic or something. Emil’s knees buckled under her, flopping uselessly, and Sigrun is forced to grab his other arm. His eyelids flared, and he coughed a bit, before babbling something in Icelandic. Emil could speak Icelandic? When had that happened?   
Lalli had started trailing after them, but Sigrun was pretty sure he was trying to stay as far away as possible. He then ducks far around them, speeding out of her vision so quickly Sigrun feels a hint of mild surprise. Sigrun really shouldn’t have been surprised. She knew scouts were fast, especially after what happened when she tried to chase after one. Anyway, back to business.

-=4=-

Mikkel sighed at the Scout in front of him. Sigrun had messed up already? Sigrun was right around the corner of this dilapidated building, so it had to be fairly serious, enough that Lalli had to get him. He hadn't heard any explosions, nor sounds of fighting, so yes, worrying. Lalli gestured at where Sigrun and Emil were,impatient. Sighing once more, he set out to figure out just what had gone wrong.

Mikkel stopped for a second, just to process what he was seeing. Sigrun, with his back to him, her hands grabbing Emil’s arms and dragging him forward as his knees buckled. They were alive, at the very least, so it hadn’t been completely ruined.

-=3=-

 

By the time Lalli had returned with Mikkel, Sigrun had managed to pull Emil a little further, and was a lot more annoyed. She shot Mikkel a look, amused by his utterly dumbfounded expression. of course, Sigrun felt the same way, but she wasn’t showing it so hilariously.  
“Close your mouth, you big lump. I understand that Emil got some nice new hair, but I’m not dying out here because he decided his new hairstyle was so nice he was going to faint over it. So grab his legs and heave!”  
Mikkel’s expression showed just how much that explained, but he obediently closed his mouth and grabbed Emil’s legs. He shouldn't complain. Its was the best explanation she could give.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here's the second chapter. Ya know how I had a point I wanted to get to in this chapter. Yeah. I didn't get to it. I kinda like it, anyway. Word count is 656.  
> Sigrun's line may not be entirely IC, but it was too precious to let go. Also, Point Zero is proving to be a fountain of purple prose. And a violation of the natural order.


	3. Possession is Nine-Tenths of the law

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which people realize something is up.

-=4=-

 

When they finally got back to the tank, lootless and burdened with one unresponsive cleanser, nobody was in a good mood. Then they had to decontaminate. Sigrun and Lalli decontaminated first, while Mikkel was trying to get a unresponsive Emil to get ready to do the same. Lalli quickly disappeared into the depths of the tank, leaving Sigrun with Mikkel.

“This is a problem”, she said from behind him.

“Which exactly, the braid or the catatonia”, Mikkel said dryly.

“Aw, take this seriously, big man.” She gave a considering look to the boy on the ground, then to the hose. She walked over to one of the empty buckets,filled it with the cold water from the hose, and then unceremoniously dumped it on Emil’s head.

Sigrun shrugged. “Always had to that to some of the new recruits. The boy’s obviously made of tougher stuff than that”, and with this she glanced at the braid “but it should work.”

Emil’s eyes flare open in sync with the stop of her sentence.

A frown appeared on Sigrun’s face. “Shoulda worked faster”

 

-=1=-

 

Emil is here. Emil is cold and wet an-. Emil is gone.

 

-=0=-

 

You open his eyes. There is cold water on his skin and you are cold. The sky above you is grey and you would have preferred a color that wasn’t so close to white.(you never want to see only white and blue again) The ground next to you is grey and wet also, but there are people there and the presence alone is enough to make it feel like a minor miracle. (you do not feel blessed) You are lying on his back.

Trying to get up feels wrong. The legs are too short, and the arms are even shorter. Your former body is not something you remember with any certainly(you remember green and red. this does not seem of importance) but it was bigger than this. You move the legs and the arms but they move themselves, muscles and tendons and joints using the afterimage of movements you cannot do by yourself,(you do not remember) but you can do it with them. Soon enough, you pull yourself up to a cross-legged position.

Then you see the people fully, a tall redheaded woman (that pings slightly, but it's not quite right), and a broad man with sideburns. The tall lady turns to the big man and says something. You don’t understand it. You know that you aren’t supposed to understand it, because who you were never knew.

It doesn’t matter. Being able to talk to someone is a luxury, so you open your mouth and speak. 

“I don’t understand you.”, and feels wrong, with a voice too loud and too deep. Being able to talk is a luxury, but you don’t like this in the least.

 

-=3=-

 

Emil springs up to a crosslegged sitting position, but his movements are stiff and jerky, not precise but picky, and Sigrun could use many words to describe how wrong it feels, but she neither has the time nor the vocabulary. Then he says something in Icelandic, and Sigrun knows there is something wrong.

She’s read the personnel files. Emil spoke one language, and that was Swedish. Not Icelandic. Sure,concerns had been expressed about communication problems, but the finnish girl could solve that. It didn’t explain why he was suddenly speaking it.

Sigrun turns to Mikkel. “What did he say?” Mikkel was just as confused as she was, but he replies with “Emil said he doesn’t understand you”.

Then Emil says something else, and the realization is not as surprising as it is obvious. It’s not Emil speaking. Not anymore.

 

-=4=-

 

Sigrun turns to him, fury in her stance. “That”, she says,jerking a finger at Emil “is not Emil. The evidence does not crash over him, it slides neatly into place. Mikkel would love for her to be wrong. His family doesn’t believe in those things, spirits and magic. Mikkel is trying very hard not to believe in myths. What Mikkel believes in is evidence, and the evidence is making it very clear and very hard. People don’t suddenly grow braids, or speak fluent Icelandic. 

Sigrun throws her hands in the air.” I’m getting the forest mage. He better have an explanation!”

His mind might have been occupied by other things, but it finally gets around to translating what not-Emil said.  
“I’m terribly sorry”

 

-=5=-

 

Tuuri is busy transcribing the book Mikkel gave her, even with the disgusting pictures and the medical terms she can’t translate. Lalli unexpectedly appears in the room-when had he come back? It was a bit too early, wasn’t it? Tuuri looks down at the amount she’s managed to copy. Definitely too early. Something has gone wrong.

She takes a closer look at her cousin and she can clearly see the panic there, along with disgust. (Tuuri knows that people say Lalli isn’t emotional, but he is. He just doesn’t have much to be emotional about anymore.)

Tuuri cocks her head. "What's wrong?"

“Tuuri,” and yes that is panic “ a spirit has overtaken Emil."  
She waves her hands, telling Lalli to please calm down because she doesn’t know what he is talking about. “Emil has been overtaken by a spirit? What do you mean?”

Lalli puts his hands together and starts fiddling his fingers. “ A spirit has overtaken him. Emil has been suppressed. His body is no longer his own.” His face scrunches up into something unpleasant and Lalli hisses. “Its a violation.”, he finishes, sounding -concerned and angry?  
Tuuri considered it. While it seemed completely impossible, her cousin didn’t lie. She opened her mouth , ready to respond when Sigrun runs into the room, filling the suddenly very tiny space.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I only removed one word when transcribing this from the forum I'm so proud of myself
> 
> Freaking finally, guys. I procrastinated typing up this chapter, which is for the best, cause it turned out way better. 
> 
> *Points up at chapter title* Did you see that? 
> 
> Also yes do the constructive criticism thing.  
> Word count is 954. Holy crap

**Author's Note:**

> It's my new story!!!!!! What such a wonderfully happy chapter title. So full of hope. So full of joy. FYI,the chapter is 693 words long, which is pretty dang long by my standards.
> 
> Sorry if it sounds pretentious, because that is not the way I would like for it to go about.


End file.
